Rep. Hunter, Marine family dispute Washington Post story

2/24/14 6:10 PM EST

Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-Calif.) and the family of a fallen Marine are criticizing The Washington Post for what they describe as gross inaccuracies and factual omissions in a recent article about the Marine's death.

Sgt. Rafael Peralta, who was killed in Iraq in 2004, was nominated for a Medal of Honor but then denied the award for the third time on Friday. Peralta had earlier been awarded the Navy Cross for his actions during a house-clearing mission where some accounts said he saved his fellow Marines by shielding them from a grenade. The Medal of Honor process has been snagged by physicians who say Peralta would have been physically unable to voluntarily move the grenade after being hit by a bullet.

In the article, published on Friday, the Post's Ernesto Londoño offered new accounts from comrades “who fought alongside Peralta that day" which suggest that the initial accounts "may not be true” and that his comrades had been pressured to play up Peralta’s actions.

In a letter to the Post on Monday, Hunter, who nominated Peralta, disputed several details of the Post report, among them how Peralta was killed, his status as an illegal immigrant, the omission of a statement from the combat cameraman in the story, and the omission of some physical evidence from the incident that was provided to the Post.

“There is no protest that the eyewitness accounts have always differed, but to ignore the full body of evidence is unfortunate and fails to accurately describe the entire situation,” Hunter wrote. “Please know that I do not want a response of any kind. However, I believe you owe it to the Peralta family to discuss with them the issues surrounding your report. A mother lost her son in combat — he’s a hero, no matter what the report attempts to suggest.”

In a separate letter to Londoño, a Peralta family spokesman argued that Peralta was never an undocumented immigrant and came to the United States on a visa to attend high school before obtaining a green card as a result of his father’s application for amnesty. The spokesman, George Sabga, also argued that characterizing the disputes over the Peralta story as “new” was inaccurate, as a Marine Corps investigation was conducted after Peralta’s death in 2005 and included some of the same allegations made in Londoño’s story, though Londoño’s piece focuses on Marines who decided to change their statements.

According to the Marine Corps Times, the suggestion that troops were pressured into fabricating accounts of Peralta’s heroism first surfaced in the initial command investigation in 2005, but the colonel assigned to investigate the incident found no evidence to support the allegation.

Sabga also claimed that Londoño attempted to “bait Mrs. Peralta into playing the ‘race card’” by repeatedly asking her whether she thought her son was denied the Medal of Honor because he was Mexican or Latino.

“In conclusion, I find your dishonesty and disrespect breathtaking,” Sabga writes. “Therefore, I expect that you muster some semblance on integrity and issue a public apology to everyone involved with Sgt. Peralta.”

Washington Post spokesperson Kristine Coratti called the "race card" claim untrue and said the Post stands by Londoño's story, but she did not go into specifics.